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Serbia has a huge potential and long tradition of growing good quality table potatoes. At the same time, Serbia is also recognized as one of the regional leaders in seed potato production constantly improving its quality through institutional development of new potato varieties.
In 2004, with an average yield of nearly 10.9 tons per hectare and total production of 975,090 tons, potato is the most widely grown vegetable in Serbia. Potatoes are sown on 89,050 ha in Serbia, out of which North Serbia region accounts for 41% of total harvested area. Most of the primary potato production takes place on privately owned farms in rural areas which is sold on the local market for consumption of fresh potatoes. The potato processing industry is supplied by large producers.
In 2004, Serbia exported 9,019 tons of fresh potato, valued at almost 540,000 US dollars. The biggest importer of fresh potato from Serbia in 2004 is Romania with more than 6,800 tons, worth 328,959 US dollars.
The potato industry in Serbia has a wide variety of products: frozen, processed and snack food. Mostly, potatoes are processed into potato chips and frozen French fries. Serbian potato snack food and frozen French fries production was estimated at 540 tons in 2004, with 13% decline from
2003. Other products of the potato industry, instant potato puree and potato flakes, accounted for 627 tons of total potato food industry production. During the 2001.2004 period, over 3,000 tons of potato food industry products (mostly frozen and potato snacks), worth more than 6.2 millions dollars were exported. |
